While Nic6le was remembering the love she had shared with her daughter on Earth, she glanced across the room at (he shelf containing the electronic book discs. Suddenly distracted, she crossed to the shelf and started reading titles. Sure enough, Max had left her some manuals on raising pigs and chickens. But that was not all. It looked as if he had given Nicole his entire private library.

Nicole smiled as she pulled out a book of fairy tales and inserted it into her reader. She flipped through the pages and stopped at the story of Sleeping Beauty. The phrase and they lived happily ever after summoned another vivid memory, this one of herself as a small child, maybe six or seven, sitting on her father’s lap in their house in the Parisian suburb of Chilly-Mazarin.

I longed as a little girl to be a princess and live happily ever after, she thought. There was no way I could have known then that my life would make even the fairy tales seem ordinary.

Nicole replaced the book disc on the shelf and returned to her chair. And now, she thought, idly surveying the room, when I thought this incredible life was over, I seem to have.been given at least a few more days.

She thought again of Richard and her intense longing to see him returned. We have shared much, my Richard. I hope I can again feel your touch, hear your laughter, and see your face. But if not, I will try not to complain. My life has already seen its share of miracles.

2

Eleanor Wakefield Turner arrived at the large auditorium in Central City at seven-thirty in the morning. Although the execution was not scheduled to take place until eight o’clock, there were already about thirty people in the front seats, some talking, most just sitting quietly. A television crew wandered around the electric chair on the stage. The execution was being broadcast live, but the policemen in the auditorium were nevertheless expecting a full house, for the government had encouraged the citizens of New Eden to witness personally the death of their former governor.